Why do websites need maintenance?

There is a common misconception in the industry about website maintenance fees. When customers buy a website, they often have an expectation that it will work flawlessly forever. Unfortunately It won’t. Your computer and your website are very much like cars. They both need maintenance to keep running smoothly. When your computer starts running worse, gets viruses, or can’t run the most modern programs at an adequate speed, it’s time to run some maintenance tasks on it, usually by a tech-savvy person/company. When your car is acting strange, making loud noises, you take it to a mechanic. Both of those services aren’t free. They are taken care of by trained professionals who charge hourly rates.

Your website may not have changed in two or three years, but software, operating systems and server hardware most likely have. Even if by some stroke of luck these things haven’t caused any issues, time itself is working against you allowing hackers more opportunities to find vulnerabilities in your systems.

Have you ever gone to pay bills on your bank or auto lenders website and been hit with a “temporarily down for maintenance” message? Most large-scale websites undergo weekly maintenance schedules. Your website probably doesn’t require all that, but a few times per year is often a good idea.

Technical Support & Software Updates

Once a website is launched, it is considered under warranty for 90 days. This warranty covers technical issues with our servers, or website content mistakes in which we are at fault. After 90 days technical support is billed at our standard hourly rate. Minor version software updates and backups are performed upon any paid maintenance.

If you are having an issue with hosting, our 24/7 Hosting Support line is available free-of-charge at (480) 624-2500.

If you are having issues with design or content, call our designers at 330-456-8319.

Website Security

The Klingstedt Brothers Company takes every precaution to protect our customers websites and data. Included in all our packages and services, we follow rigorous security guidelines. We use only the latest stable versions of well-established third party software when we launch your site to the public, and our servers follow industry standard security protocols.

Additional Preventative Measures

Remember, security is not about risk elimination, but rather risk reduction. Risk will never be zero. You can, however, employ tools and steps to reduce it where you can so as not to become part of the statistic. If you believe that that your website might be at higher risk, due to ecommerce, storage (or perceived storage) of sensitive information or due to previous hacks, additional precautions are recommended. Your website is also higher risk if it has not been updated or maintained for an extended period. Outdated software makes your website a prime target simply due to ease. We recommend doing a review of your website if no changes have been made in 8-12 months.

SSL helps prevent attackers or intrusive companies such as ISPs from tampering with the data sent between your websites and your users’ browsers. It is critical for protecting sensitive information such as a credit card numbers but it also protects your site from malware and prevents others from injecting advertisements into your resources.

Website Repair

If you find that your website has been blacklisted, that content on your website has been changed, or have been otherwise notified that your site has been compromised, the site will need to be cleaned and restored. The extent of the damage can vary, and a review will need to be performed for an accurate estimate of time required. One-time website repair is done in-house and is charged at an hourly rate. Alternatively, if you would like ongoing repair support, we also offer services billed annually.

Why would anyone ever hack my website?

Resources - They want to use your server - They will use your system like an internet relay chat so they can discuss openly things they do not want to discuss on their own servers. They store illicit material (pornography, pirated music, pirated software etc.) on your system so this illegal activity does not lead to their own computers.

Theft - To steal services, valuable files or your personal credentials in order to access your accounts or the accounts of your website visitors. They use this data to gain access to billing, merchant accounts and third party systems.

Hacktivism - The drivers for these attacks could be monetary or abusive. However, they are often protesting a religious or political agenda; showing off to peers within the hacking community, using it as bragging rights.

Personal Reasons – Such as spying on friends, family, coworkers or for revenge.

Bordom - To some, hacking is just an amusing game or challenge just to prove how smart you are. You can employ more security measures to protect your website e.g. Firewalls, anti-spyware, anti-viral etc. , but these type of hackers just find it more of a challenge to defeat these security defenses and your website crashing is just another trophy on their hacker shelf.

Why do sites end up on blacklists?

Thousands of websites are blacklisted daily. Many of these blacklisted websites are legitimate businesses, online portals, academic sites, entertainment outlets and more. the blacklisting often occurs as a result of the sites getting hacked and having malicious code injected without the permission of the websites' owners. Malicious hackers and automated bots infect websites with malicious computer code (i.e., web malware). Security companies, search engines, browser manufacturers, and others will prevent or deter users from visiting these compromised sites to protect those sites' visitors. Hacked websites may also be used to launch spam and phishing campaigns. For example, a compromised site might try to convince Internet users to visit a fake banking page, buy pharmaceuticals, or something similar. This can cause sites to be blacklisted, too.

FAQ

I received an email from Klingstedt Brothers Web Design saying my website was flagged for malware!

These emails are sent from our free automated scanners warning you of potential threats. Many times the scanner itself removes the offending files, and nothing else needs done. It is recommended that after receiving this email, you inspect your website thoroughly and check that your site has not been blacklisted (https://mxtoolbox.com/blacklists.aspx). If you continue to receive this email, please forward it to our graphics department for review.

I received an email saying my domain is about to expire!

Domain renewals are big business for scammers. To be sure the email is legitimate, verify that the message came from a klingstedtbrothers.com, kbprint.us or secureserver.net email address. Also, domain names and renewals are generally less than $20 per year. If the message you receive looks like a bill for upwards of $50 to $300, it’s most likely a scam.